It was my first introduction to CAPREO and was delighted to discover a European wine business which really is connected with the South African Wine industry. They operate in Germany as a marketing and sales arm of the SA Wine industry, representing 50 farms, selling and fulfilling wine sales to consumers throughout Europe. Capreo is a spin-off of logistics giant Rhiem, who they use for their storage and shipping functions, They generate great value for wine estates and provide a winning solution for European tourists: - they work with the tasting room staff so that when Europeans come through their doors, they prompt them to take orders, which are then passed on to Capreo, who then do the fulfilment in Europe, and continue to sell to them, providing them with interesting content on the wines and wineries of South Africa. CAPREO (previously known as Red Simon) is now celebrating 10 years in the business, and have shown a growth of over 20% in the last year - not too shabby in the difficult financial world in which we live.

I attended their Summer Cup prize-giving on Tues 2 May at one of their Partner wineries, the beautiful Waterford. The prize-giving is a great idea which rewards and honours the top sales people from the tasting rooms. Their top 100 tasting room staff attended the function and the top 3 in each winery category were celebrated to much cheering and shouting!

Everyone was in their finery - gold, black and white as the dress code suggested, and I was totally blown away to see the volumes sold by these energetic sales staff, with their CAPREO mail order business shipping over 220.000 bottles of South African premium wines to European wine lovers in the last year!